This Extraordinary Being
"This Extraordinary Being" is the sixth episode of the first season of Watchmen, which first aired on HBO on November 24, 2019. It is principally the origin story of Hooded Justice, a minor character from the Watchmen limited series.
Synopsis
Laurie tries to get Angela to sign a waiver for medical care so they can get the Nostalgia out of her system before it sets in, but Angela slips into a lucid dream. She experiences Will Reeves' memories as one of the first black officers in the New York police force circa 1938. These are intermingled with memories from the 1921 Tulsa race massacre.After attempting to arrest Fred, a white shopkeeper, for setting fire to a Jewish deli, Will is warned not to interfere and be aware of "Cyclops", and finds Fred walking free hours later. As he walks home, other white officers abduct him, cover him in a hood, and lynch him, but stop before he chokes to death, warning him not to interfere. Leaving the noose on and carrying the hood, Will walks home but observes a young couple being attacked by thugs. Donning the mask, he rescues the couple, who thank him for the help, and news of his deed is covered in the papers, making him a hero. His wife urges him to adopt the role, and he takes on the vigilante name "Hooded Justice", creating a costume that obscures his ethnicity. He finds the Ku Klux Klan are behind "Cyclops" but does not know the extent of their plan.
Hooded Justice is invited to the Minutemen by Nelson Gardner, the real identity of Captain Metropolis. Will accepts, and he and Nelson engage in sexual relations, but Nelson cautions Will to stay in his masked identity in front of the other Minutemen. Years pass, and Will and June have a son. After a riot in a movie theater, Will discovers "Cyclops" involves hypnotic-like control of blacks to attack each other using special film projectors, and tracks down the New York operation to a warehouse. He calls Nelson for the Minuteman's help, but Nelson refuses to let them become involved. Will takes out the operation on his own, burning down the warehouse while taking one of the projectors. After yelling at his son for dressing as Hooded Justice, June tells Will to stay away as she is moving back to Tulsa with their son.
In the near present, Will is shown responsible for Judd's death, using a modified version of the film projector to coerce Judd into hanging himself, believing Judd is part of "Cyclops".
Angela is brought out of her dreams in Lady Trieu's quarters.
Production
"This Extraordinary Being" is mostly shown in black and white, outside of the opening and closing scenes. Selected elements of some scenes are shown in color, for example, imagery of Will's mother playing the piano in some shots. Additionally, in seemingly one-shot takes, young Will is swapped out in scenes with Angela to show her immersion in the Nostalgia-induced lucid dream. Stephen Williams, a prior collaborator with showrunner Damon Lindelof during Lost, was brought in to direct this episode even before the episode had been written. Williams, as an African-Canadian himself, was drawn in by the premise of the episode from Lindelof's description, and opted to use the black and white filming approach as this episode needed to be presented differently from the rest of the series, using only colored elements to indicate "the incursion of other memories that were pivotal and meaningful and significant for Will that imposed themselves on that landscape". Williams ran several test filming runs for many of the episode's practical effects using stand-ins for the main actors. Many of the shots where Adepo and King were done with simple camera movement, allowing the actors to switch places during the shot. Other long-takes were also done with practical effects: the shot taken of Will's point-of-view of his near-lynching was done by hoisting the camera out of the operator's hands, holding it there long enough, and then lowering back down to continue the shot, as to create the immersion they needed for the scene.Most of this episode was filmed in Macon, Georgia, which served as a 1930s New York City.
Much of the origin of Hooded Justice is based on the material that Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons had established for the Watchmen limited series. While Hooded Justice is a minor character, whose identity was never revealed within the limited series, he played a key role in stopping the attempted rape of Silk Spectre by The Comedian shortly after the Minutemen had posed for their first photo session. Many elements of the associated extra content written by Moore and Gibbons, particularly the fictional Under the Hood memoirs by Nite Owl, were drawn from and referenced in the episode: his saving of a young couple as the first known appearance, his appearance at the Minutemen photo session, and his homosexuality. The episode's title is taken from Nite Owl's introduction of Hooded Justice in Under the Hood.
Will is shown being inducted into the New York Police Department by Samuel J. Battle, who in reality was the first black officer in the force.
Williams points out that Watchmen endeavors to "unearth... that part of our collective history that has been neglected, or omitted, like Tulsa 1921, in the pilot.... These are all parts of African American history, and obviously, by extension, therefore straight-up American history that have been given short shrift."
While not fully confirmed by the show's staff, the character of Fred, the racist white supermarket owner played by Glenn Fleshler, appears to allude to Fred Trump, the father of Donald Trump, based on both appearance and other elements that aligned with Fred Trump's biography, including his involvement with the KKK.
Reception
Critical response
"This Extraordinary Being" received critical acclaim. On Rotten Tomatoes, the episode has an approval rating of 96% with an average score of 9.33 out of 10, based on 28 reviews. The site's critical consensus reads, "Revealing and relevant, 'This Extraordinary Being' cleverly shows the long-term effects of generational trauma and deep-seated racism."Accolades
The episode was nominated for the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Individual Episode featuring an LGBTQ character. In addition, Stephen Williams was nominated for the Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing – Drama Series for the episode, while Damon Lindelof and Cord Jefferson were nominated for the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Writing in a Dramatic Series for the episode, which was won by Nichelle Tramble Spellman for "Monster", the first episode of her Apple TV+ show Truth Be Told. "This Extraordinary Being" was nominated for a Hugo for Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form, alongside "A God Walks into Abar".For the 72nd Primetime Emmy Awards, this episode is nominated for both Outstanding Directing and Outstanding Writing in the limited series categories, and Adepo was nominated for his performance.